How to upgrade your communication skills using the PEMS tool

(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hi, we are the 3 English Experts. I'm Rebecca. I'm Dave. I'm Birgit. And welcome to this episode. 3 English Experts is your English podcast to help you speak better English and create a positive and happy mindset for your English learning journey. Hello and welcome back to this episode. It's a new episode. And this time we're going to talk about some communication tool that Dave is our communications expert. And he has brought back, I was going to say he has brought into our episode, a nice tool he's going to talk about. And this is for learners who want to level up to think about their structure, structure sentences, structuring thoughts, and being, I think, convincing when talking to other people, maybe in meetings, in English meetings. I'm handing over to Dave now. Dave, what have you got for us today? All right. Thank you, Birgit. And hello, everyone. So yeah, you know those situations in meetings that you've had, I'm sure, where it's somebody stands up, it's their turn to talk. They start talking, they go on and they go on. There doesn't seem to be a structure to what they're saying. They use lots of ums and you like, yeah, and right, and all these little filler words. As I said, they don't seem to get to the point. And then at the end, you wonder what they were talking about in the first place. So that's why I try to bring in what I call the tool called PEMS. It's a very simple structure to help you communicate in a more structured way. And PEMS stands for Point, Example, Meaning, and Summary. Okay. And that helps you then, as I said, to have a deeper structure that hopefully connects easier with the people that you're talking to and also maybe inspires and persuades them to take action that you would like them to take. This is how it works out. The point, the P, the first P is point. So this is where you say what your key idea is, or maybe your suggestion, your proposal, what you want to get out of the meeting, what you want to get across to the people. Then you give an example of this. Okay. That's the E. Show it in action, whatever it is you're wanting to talk about. Maybe give some data, a story, or scenario based on it, a little story. The next one is the meaning. So you there try and explain why this really matters, why it's important, what's the big insight or value to it all. And then finally, you have the S, which is the summary. So you can wrap it up, but also try and include some kind of a takeaway or a next step. Okay. So here's a little one I prepared for you earlier. And we want to imagine a meeting situation. Of course, you could always use these also for emails. So if there's an email or a Slack exchange between various people, you could use that here as well to keep it structured and concise. And the example I have to give you is the situation of upgrading a tool, maybe a project management tool, like going to Asana. So switching to Asana as a tool to use. Okay. So we start at the top with our point, think we should switch to Asana. Then you give the example in the marketing project, we hit every deadline with less stress. Now you want to give it the meaning, it gave the team ownership and clarity and reduce the feeling of being micromanaged. And last but not least, a little summary stroke call to action. If we want more autonomy and speed, Asana supports this and we should switch. Okay. That's the PEMS in action with your point, example, meaning and summary. Why does that work? Yes. Hello. This is where I'm joining in. I'm here. I'm not asleep. I promise. It does work. I think when you think about communication these days, things have become so short. Think about TikTok videos and these reels and stuff. We're always pushed for time and you have to get your point across really quickly. People have a very short attention span. It's got to be clear. It's got to be understandable. So the first point you've got here is clarity. It organises first of all, so you're not rambling and you've got your points clear in your head. I think this meaning connects facts to emotions, which is really important. As soon as people feel somehow emotionally connected to something, they're much more likely to pay attention, to buy if you're trying to sell something or just to engage with something if they feel like an emotional connection. And then you've got to do the call to action that you say at the end, because people go, oh, that's really nice. And then do nothing. Give them a clear call to action, book this, organise this. Let's have a meeting. Let's buy this system. Let's, like you said, upgrade to this tool. People need simple guidelines, I think, guiding others towards decisions. So tell them at the end, this is what we need to do to make this happen. Yeah, it works. I think it's short, simple, doesn't overcomplicate. Absolutely. Yeah. I gave everybody some homework and I even did the homework as well. Here we go. Of course, of course. I was just thinking this would be for schools also for teachers, a good method, wouldn't it? Maybe the lessons will go faster. Less input, less content. Yes, we got some homework to create our own PEMs. And I have some very good students with me today, Birgit and Rebecca. They did one. But here's one I prepared earlier. And of course, it has to do with listening to the Three English Experts podcast. Whatever else could it be? Hey, guys, it's got to be that. OK, so you should listen to the Three English Experts podcast to improve your English in a natural way. In each episode, Birgit, Rebecca and I talk about interesting topics from grammar and vocabulary, motivation and mindset and communication skills and culture tips. This helps you learn how English is actually spoken, not just how it looks in the books. Because of this, you can understand English better and speak more confidently in real life. Wow. Can I clap myself? Very convincing. Thank you, Dave. Oh, by the way, just do it. All this will be in the show notes. We will attach this. You can always come back and have a look at it. Who's next? Who's going to give the homework? Who volunteers? I can. I'm going to put your hand up, Birgit. What a pass. Have I? I didn't even notice. It's a reflex. But I must admit, I haven't written it out as nicely as you have. So I have to do that for an order to put it on to the show notes for later. But I'm going to talk you through it. Should we knock a point off for not writing it out, Rebecca? I'm not sure. Yes. We'll see how the performance is. All right. OK. OK, so my point would be you should focus on five major tenses when you want to improve your English. That's my point. The example is, yeah, focus on the simple present, the present continues, the simple past, the present perfect and the world future, because they are the most used tenses in the English language. The meaning is that you can, for the moment, not for all times, forget about the rest. So inverted commas, I put my hands and make a funny sign. But that brings you into talking much faster and in a better way and easier. And my summary would be what I have used here is these tenses. I don't think I've used any others and I haven't heard many others in this episode so far, I think. And takeaway and something for you to do is try it out next time you want to bring a message across in English, maybe talk about it or write it out and then check which tenses have you actually used. Wow. Very good. Very good. Now I have to write it out, but I can listen to what I've just said. Listen back to it. Okay. Thank you. Cool. I think we'll give you, I think that's 10 out of 10, isn't it? Yeah, it's a 10 out of 10. Yeah. You can knock some off. Yeah, that's good. Oh no, I'm a nice teacher. Anyway, Rebecca, what about your version? Yes. So my version is conversation club. My first point is, I think that we, the three English experts, should start a conversation club for our listeners. Uh-huh. For example, we could have maybe a few hours every month that are flexible where people could drop in, book a day or book an appointment, and we will be there to talk to people, help with vocab, and just give people an opportunity to have conversation. Meaning, I think in my experience, it's important to speak. This is what people are really missing. Everyone has listening practise. People can watch films. People can read books. People can do their grammar. But what people are really craving, I think, is the opportunity to just speak. And that's the most important thing. That's why we're here. What's language without speaking? What's language without talking? So my summary is, yes, I think we should start this to connect with our listeners. I think we should offer a few appointments a month, different topics. We can talk about different things. And I think it would be a nice opportunity for our listeners to have an opportunity to speak, to meet us, to talk to us. And we also get to meet our listeners, which would be really nice. So that's my takeaway. Let's do it. Let's do it. Yes. So that was the PEMS, guys. I hope you enjoyed our examples as well. And I hope you'll try it out in the near future so that you don't ramble. You do it in a nice, structured way. Get your message across. And hopefully, get the thing done, which you would like to get done. Good luck with the PEMS. Today's golden nugget is been and gone. Can be a little bit confusing sometimes. So where has he been? And where has he gone? What is the difference here? We're using present perfect. Where has he been? And where has he gone? For example, you might hear people say, he has been to Italy. He has been to Italy. Or he has gone to Italy. So what's the difference? Been means he went and he came back. So it's almost like he visited. He went and he came back. And you can say, he has been to Italy three times. Or he has never been, like he's never visited. He has gone to Italy means he is still there. He hasn't come back yet. It could be he's gone permanently. He's gone to Italy. No, he has moved. He has gone. Or it could just be it's Wednesday. Well, he's gone to Italy. He's not coming back until next week. So he could just be on holiday. Other point I would bring in here as well with this been, people have to say, I have been in London. No, I've been to, when you say you've visited, yeah, I've been to London many times. I've been to Mallorca. We're not on Mallorca. I know the Germans are always on Mallorca. We just go to Mallorca. So generally anywhere with a place you've been to, yeah. Any other points there, Birgit, that you can think of? Yes, I've been thinking of the sun has gone. I'm just looking out of the window. I haven't been in the sun today. Yes. And then you can use in. I haven't been in the sunshine, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's gone. When you're travelling, of course, it's to the idea, right? Travelling. Yeah. And another thing that's maybe funny because that sticks to people's minds. So you expect somebody to be in the room and that's, for example, my son, but he's so quick in and out of rooms and places. So one moment he's there and then you say like, where's he gone? He's gone. He's gone. He's gone. He's been and gone. He's been here a minute ago, but now he's gone. Yeah. That happens a lot in our house. Yeah. So one of these golden nuggets is all on our 50 or in should be in our 50 golden nuggets PDF that we have available. So please grab that at our website and you'll see that also on the Padlet that goes along with it. So that's another one of our 50 golden nuggets, guys. Okay. So thank you for listening today. And in our next episode coming out, it will already be Christmas time. Short before Christmas. We wish you a Merry Christmas. We wish you a... Too early yet, Dave. We're not there yet. Oh, why not? It's a bit festive already. Why not? It's November. It is. Yes. And we're going to talk about some funny stories, maybe dating back to our childhood. We'll share some fun and some, of course, some interesting Christmas vocabulary, and I hope you'll be tuning in. And of course, you can also listen to two more episodes we have already sent out or published on Christmas last year and the year before. Okay. Hope you'll be tuning in again, listening to us. And bye for now. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening today, guys. Just to remind you that we are offering a workshop, a three English experts workshop on January the 23rd. It's going to be online so you can take part no matter where you are. It's about four hours working with me, working with Birgit, working with Dave. There'll also be a group session. We did one of these recently. It was great. It was so much fun and really productive and really useful. So if you're interested, head over to our new website, threeenglishexperts.com. So the address is the same, but we have a new look. We have a new logo. We've been working hard on that. So have a look at that. You can also sign up for the golden nuggets, as Dave said. And if you're interested in joining us in January, let us know. Book your place now. Thanks. Bye bye.